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Live At The Red Garter Vol. 2

From the late '60s to the mid '90s, the Fania All Stars were probably the most important and influential group in salsa, Afro-Cuban and Puerto Rican music. What began as a showcase band for a young label developed into a Latino supergroup capable of filling stadiums. The band's members were either successful bandleaders or the top musicians on their instruments at the time. As Fania Records expanded its horizons and endeavoured to reach outside its traditional Spanish speaking market in the 1970s, the All Stars became their musical ambassadors, traveling across the globe from South America to Africa to Europe spreading the salsa gospel.

But that was the future! The Fania All Stars began at the Red Garter Club in Greenwich Village. By 1967 Fania Records was on the rise and label owner Jerry Masucci was wanting to feature a showcase of all his artists, which now included long-established bandleaders Ray Barretto and Fania co-owner Johnny Pacheco, alongside the new generation (Willie Colon, Larry Harlow, Monguito, Joe Bataan, Louie Ramirez, Ralph Robles, Bobby Valentin). The idea was to record a live session which would serve as a showcase for the label using the all star format which had already proved popular by Fania's rivals Tico and Alegre.

In 1968, Masucci and popular Latin music/jazz DJ Symphony Sid talked Red Garter promoter Jack Hooke into putting on a series of nights with the Fania musicians, but to broaden the appeal of the concerts and records, a host of guest stars were added to the bill. The Live At the Red Garter Vol 2 album sleeve reads like a who's who of Afro-Cuban and Puerto Rican music in the late 1960s! Special guest stars include the mambo king Tito Puente, Eddie Palmieri on piano and timbalero/sonero Jimmy Sabater from the million selling Joe Cuba Sextet. A supporting cast from the bands of Puente, Palmieri, Pacheco and Barretto included vocalists Ismael Miranda, Pete Conde Rodriguez, bassist Bobby Rodriguez and timbalero Orestes Vilato. A truly staggering bill though at the time, many musicians were just starting out, Willie Colon was just 18, however, almost every player present at these sessions would go on to be a salsa star in the next decade.

After Barretto's introduction, the band gets counted in and that unmistakable bassline starts, 8 bars of low-end heaven as smooth as Baileys on ice, the trademark riff to Son Cuero Y Boogaloo, a Barretto's signature tune of the period. It's much more than just a boogaloo, it's a son montuno with soul! An earlier version of the song had appeared on Barretto's album Hard Hands, but this live version smoked! After the coro and brass sections traded 8's the tension builds, then the band hits a break and timbalero Orestes Vilato comes in and blazes a monsterous solo.

The next track Noche featured its composer, pianist Larry Harlow, on a slow guajira montuno. Harlow was a non-Latino but his solo is pure Cuban proving it's not where you're from but it's how you play and what you feel that matters! The last track on the opening side was a full-on soul/funk instrumental jam called Red Garter Strut, the Fania All Stars kicking like Junior Walker or the Famous Flames! Another example of the cross-cultural experiments going on at the time in New York.

Side two is equally mixed, a Charlie Palmieri funky montuno salsa called Kikapoo Joy Juice opening the set. An uptempo dance tune with the vocalists singing in English, a sign of the times when boogaloo ruled everything in sight. Next up, If This World Were Mine, a Marvin Gaye cover featuring Joe Bataan and female vocalist La La doing their best Marvin and Tammi Tyrrell impression over a slow soulful latin-tinged groove.Richie's Bag closes side 2, written by and featuring pianist Richie Ray, another soul montuno dancefloor classic with the vocalists singing English lyrics quoting Joe Bataan's present and future hits , Gypsy woman, Subway Joe, "Ordinary Guy.

And that's it! The whole album is just 6-tracks long but it serves as a historical musical document of something new and vibrant that was evolving in Latin New York in the '60s. A coming together of black, white and brown as music crossed ethnic barriers. Music, like society, was attempting to integrate. What Masucci and Pacheco succeeded to do with this recording and Fania Records in general was to bring together the older and new generations of Latin musicians, where it became the roots of what became salsa in the next decade, whilst making the first recordings of the Fania All Stars, the band that would be most associated with spreading the music to a global audience. These reasons make this album a must for any true aficionado of Puerto Rican music from New York.

Politico

Politico, the fifth full-length album by Mexican Institute of Sound (producer and songwriter Camilo Lara) is an album that almost wasn't. In 2011, an enormous amount of the explosive C4 was discovered next door to Lara's residence -- it was set to be detonated; by whom and for what purpose was never determined. In a recent interview, Lara said that he didn't deliberately set out to go into politics, but that politics had come to his house. These 13 songs, composed and assembled by Lara, address the chaos, destruction, tragedy, and violence that have become all-too-familiar elements in Mexican lives. Politico is a statement in the same way that the Clash's Sandinista! or the Sex Pistols' Never Mind the Bollocks were, but it isn't nostalgic. Nor is it sonically similar to either. Longtime fans of MIS may have some initial issues because there are vocals on almost every tune. But not only do they not they detract from the set's appeal, their urgent expressions add to it. While the topical nature of these songs is undeniable, it doesn't mean this isn't a fun record. Quite the opposite. Lara isn't didactic in his lyrics; these are personal observations, and in that way, carry more weight than slogans. His unique compositional style makes them musically irresistible, and compelling. He uses Mexico's and Latin America's folk forms -- cumbias, descargas, sons, corridos, mariachis, bandas, rancheras, cha-chas, rhumbas, pachangas, and more -- and hard welds them to slamming beats, layered melodies, and infectious keyboard grooves, all via a staggering yet organic-sounding mÉlange of samples from rock & roll, hip-hop, funk, house, disco, techno, etc. Check the wild marimba samples that introduce the melody to Tipo Raro, which originally appeared in the film Made in Mexico. Lara retains the melody throughout, but busts it from its context; he runs head-on into multi-tracked Farfisa organs, a deeply distressed beat, four-on-the-floor loops, rapping, and a brittle bassline that fires directly from the center. Especulando is a driving, funky electro jam. Es-Toy uses accordion and darkly tinged double trombones (à la Willie Colón), a pulsing organ, and chanted vocals. Despite its skittering dance beat and its mariachi horns, Más is pure, frenetic punk rock. Politico is easily the most sophisticated record in the MIS catalog. This is political music without apology; it's also frenzied dance party music that's virtually peerless. - Thom Jurek (All Music Guide)

M.I.S. tours the world performing at major festivals like Coachella and Lollapalooza, with a wide range ofhigh-profile television and videogame uses, including HBO 'Entourage' & 'East Bound & Down,' as well as'Californication' and videogames like EA Sports' 'FIFA' and the new 'Grand Theft Auto V', for which he curatedone of the radio stations 'East Los FM.'

The sound of old Mexican cumbias, boleros and mariachi tunes scrambled with samples, effects and beats.- NEW YORK TIMES

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